The present invention relates to digital networks, and in particular, to the problem of provisioning digital devices in a swarm.
As used herein, a swarm is defined as a set of cooperating digital devices communicating over a digital network. One example of a swarm is a group of wireless access points (AP) providing wireless services to clients. Other examples of swarms are clusters of computers operating as a render farm, or other distributed computing tasks.
The composition of the swarm may change dynamically. As an example, APs may be added dynamically to a swarm, or may be removed from service.
When an AP is first powered up it starts in what is known as an unprovisioned state; it has not been provided with information such as operating channel, operating power levels, SSIDs, security settings, and possibly the regulatory domain the AP is operating in.
In a standalone AP such as those sold by Netgear, Linksys, Apple, and the like, the AP is set up to be provisioned over a wired Ethernet link. Such an AP initially powers up with a fixed IP address of 192.168.1.1, and is provisioned by making an HTTP connection to the AP with a web browser, authenticating with a presupplied username and password, and using the browser to provision the device and finally restart it. This provisioning scheme fails if the local network already has a device active at the fixed IP address the AP is configured to use, or may fail due to a number of other network configuration issues.
In provisioning a swarm of wireless access points, each AP obtains its address dynamically (DHCP). Some APs in the swarm may be mesh-based, having no wired connection. This simple provisioning model would seem to be inapplicable.
What is needed is a way to initially provision members of a swarm of wireless access points.